Sheet metal and other workpieces can be formed into a wide range of useful products. Fabrication equipment or machines are often used for such processes. For example, in the case of punch presses, the press is typically configured to hold a plurality of tools for forming a variety of shapes and sizes of indentations and/or holes in the sheet metal and workpieces. Tools of this sort commonly include at least one punch assembly and corresponding die.
A conventional punch assembly typically includes a punch guide, a punch holder, and a punch. When the punch assembly is mounted in a punch press, and located in a working position of the press, i.e., beneath a ram (or integrally connected to the ram) and vertically aligned with a corresponding die, the punch and holder can be driven out from the punch guide, through an opening in a stripper plate, in order to form an indentation or a hole through a sheet workpiece with the tip of the punch. The stripper plate, which is attached to an end of the punch guide, prevents the workpiece from following the punch, upon its retraction back into the punch guide.
In contrast to the above-described conventional designs of punch assemblies, many presses have been designed to function with multi-tools. As is known, a multi-tool has a plurality of tool-receipt openings adapted to receive respective tools. Thus, as opposed to only a single tool being available at a single tool-mount location of a punch press, a multi-tool allows any of the differing tools (e.g., punches) it carries to be available. As such, configuring a press to accommodate a multi-tool enables the press to have enhanced versatility with regard to deformation and/or punching processes.
One type of punch press designed to accommodate multi-tools is the multiple-station turret press; however, a variety of other presses are further known to have been configured for multi-tools, such as single-station presses or other presses not having turrets. Punch press manufacturers (of which there are many) routinely design their machines so as to normally accommodate and function with tools of their own design and specification. However, it is often the case that purchasers of these presses are interested in using tooling, including multi-tools, of other manufacturers. As such, adaptors have been designed for such purpose, i.e., to interface the alternate tooling (of one manufacturer) with the press machine (of other manufacturer).
To date, adaptors have been commercialized to enable interfacing between multi-tools and particular punch presses. However, in many cases, the overall functioning of the multi-tools and/or punch presses has been limited based on the design of the adaptors. Embodiments of the invention focus on a multi-tool adaptor which enhances overall performance of the multi-tools on which the adaptor is intended and the punch presses with which the multi-tools are desired to interface.